 |  |
|
| |
|
|
|
|
Every so often (probably once a year for USC retirees), the university's Information Technology Services (ITS) requires that you change the password for your USC computer account. This is done for security purposes to reduce the likelihood that someone who is not authorized to do so is using your account. Many retirees find the requirement more than annoying. The primarily reason for this is that changing one's password now requires knowing one’s ten-digit university identification number. Since these ten-digit ID numbers are a relatively recent creation, many of us were unaware that we had one.
The university has "uncoupled" Social Security Numbers from computer and e-mail accounts. This means that you can no longer use your Social Security Number in the password-changing process. You now must use your ten-digit university ID number (unless you are a pre-retiree still on the USC payroll, in which case you can use your your seven-digit employee identification number). If you do not know your ten-digit ID number, you can obtain it simply by contacting Maricela Hinojosa at the Emeriti Center. Maricela has access to the databse containing these numbers and can look yours up for you. Call her at (213) 740-8169 or e-mail her at marih@usc.edu.
If you already know your university ID number, you can change your password by clicking on this link and entering the information requested. After you have changed your password online, don't forget to change it in the "Accounts" settings of your personal computer's e-mail client (e.g., Microsoft Outlook, Outlook Express, Thundebird, etc.), if you use one.
You may find the following tutorial helpful in changing your password.
Figure 1.
Note the suggestions for creating safer passwords (Figure 1):
1. Your new password should be seven or eight characters long and consist of alphanumeric characters.
2. The password should not be a word found in any dictionary or language.
3. It should not be derived from any publicly available information about you such as your name or some permutation of it.
4. It should contain at least one non-alphabetic character and one capitalized alphabetic character.
Figure 2.
IGNORE this paragraph (Figure 2). It no longer applies.
Figure 3.
Using the vertical scroll bar (right margin of monitor), scroll down to the gray shaded area. Here you will enter information about your USC computer account (Figure 3):
1. In the first box, type your USC username.
2. In the second box, type your ten-digit university identification number.
3. In the fifth box, type your CURRENT USC password.
4. Type a NEW password in the sixth box.
5. Finally, RETYPE the new password that you just created in the seventh box.
Figure 4.
After entering this information, select the ONE button that describes your computer account. If your account is administered through the Emeriti Center OR if you have an RCF account administered by another department, click the second button. If your account is administered by a unit on the Health Sciences Campus, click the third button. If your account is administered by one of the specified units in the "Departmental Accounts" section, then click on the appropriate button in this section (Figure 4).
Figure 5.
When you have entered your username, ten-digit ID number, current password, and your newly-created password (twice) and have selected the type of computer account that you have, click on "Change Password" at the bottom of the form to complete the changing of your password (Figure 5).
Figure 6.
You will then see the screen in Figure 6. Note that you are advised that "[t]he password change will take approximately 1 hour to propagate through the system."
If you have questions or comments about this column, send them to rstallin@usc.edu.
